Time And Happiness

The Science Behind What Makes Us Happy

Social Media can change (and save) lives

Eric: Can you talk about your book, Dragonfly Effect?

Jennifer: This was a personal project, inspired by a story that my student Robert Chatwani shared a few years ago. His best friend, Sameer Bhatia, was diagnosed with leukemia, and there was no match in the bone marrow registry for him. Robert, friends and family launched a campaign that harnessed social media to get 20,000 South Asians into the registry. And they surpassed their goal, getting 24,611 South Asians into the registry in 11 short weeks. It was this story — how they accomplished this goal — that inspired The Dragonfly Effect. The reality is that there are almost 10,000 people every year who are in need of a bone marrow match. So the book allowed us to grow Robert’s story and also provides a roadmap for anyone in this position. The Dragonfly book was about this idea of the power of a story to move people. The use of social networks was just a mechanism by which you could see that any individual with a single focused goal and a story that’s powerful to them and that might resonate with others might be able to do something quite remarkable, which is to move others and achieve that single focused goal.

Another reason why The Dragonfly Effect was important to me personally was because we were able to integrate in the new work on happiness and meaningfulness. As you summarized when writing about our "On Happiness vs. Meaningfulness" paper (with Roy, Kathleen and Emily), meaningfulness is associated with being more of a giver than a taker, and the desire to have a positive impact on the world. Those basic motivations are at the core of the Dragonfly Effect model. And, in fact, writing the book was deeply meaningful. I think all of us have had that urge to do something that matters and hopefully help others in impactful ways.

Stories give us meaning

Eric: What’s the most common thing people are doing wrong in terms of making their lives happier or more meaningful? What mistakes are most people making on a day-to-day basis?

Jennifer: I’m convinced the questions of (a) what is really meaningful and (b) how you spend your time are useful filters by which you can make better decisions. However, the question, "What is meaningful to me?" is a difficult one to answer. How do you begin to get your head around that question? Some new studies suggest if we spend time thinking about stories in our lives, that might be a more effective way of figuring out what is meaningful vs. not. For example, if you ask people simple questions like, "Tell me one story in your day" or "Tell me the top 10 stories that define your life," you can get individuals thinking more about what is meaningful to them. One hypothesis is that when you do that, you’ll make choices and decisions in a way that might be not just wiser but also potentially also more interesting, distinctive and impactful.

Here’s what to do next

Eric: What’s one simple and accessible thing people can do that makes them happier or their lives more meaningful?

Jennifer: One useful exercise is doing an audit on how you are spending your time. To what degree is how your time being spent aligned with how you want to spend your time? Interestingly, small shifts in how you spend your time often have a bigger impact on your ultimate happiness than you might imagine.